


I don't know how to fix it myself

by cinderchild



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Hurt/Comfort, Sickfic
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-09-08
Updated: 2016-10-27
Packaged: 2018-02-16 15:03:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,531
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2274255
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cinderchild/pseuds/cinderchild
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Story is based on this post:<br/>Bucky manages to avoid being found until one night, with no warning, he shows up in Tony’s kitchen.  Tony is understandably kind of alarmed when he finds an assassin sitting at his table, but Bucky just kind of holds his arm out toward Tony and very quietly tells him, “I don’t know how to fix it myself.”  </p><p>Taken from:<br/>http://avengersclubx.tumblr.com/post/96928509466/canis-familiaris-bucky-manages-to-avoid-being<br/><br/>Takes place after Winter Soldier, before Age of Ultron. AU.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is a work in progress. Please feel free to leave feedback. Thanks. 
> 
> Rating may change as story progresses.

“What have you got for me, Tony?” Steve says tiredly into the phone. He had barely gotten three hours of sleep before his cell rang; it was the secure phone, used only for his mission.  
“Reports of gunfire, explosions, and a base in the mountains just north of Svalyava, close to the Slovakian border, less than 30 minutes ago. It could be him, it fits the pattern.”  
Steve sighed. They had exhausted every lead from the Kremlin file Natasha had given to him, now they were relying only on intel from Tony, Hill, or Coulson. Mostly the intel was rumours and speculation that it might be HYDRA. Since SHIELD fell, and HYDRA with it, intel has been spotty and separating SHIELD from HYDRA was becoming more and more infuriating.  
“All right. Thanks Tony, we’ll check it out. Thank you for the jet again.” Steve hung up the phone and rubbed his face. Nothing sounded better than another 12 hours of sleep, but he couldn’t chance missing him. Of course there was no guarantee it was him… Steve pushed that thought away. If he gave up hope, it’d be like Bucky falling from that train all over again. He glanced over to the other bed where Sam was sleeping peacefully, snoring lightly as was his habit, and felt guilty. Sam had been nothing but supportive and kind this whole mission, the past year almost, but he was not a super soldier. He did not have the endurance that Steve did. Steve had seen him exhausted and ran into the ground for him, and still he refused to back down. Steve knew that deep down Sam wasn’t doing it for him, he wasn’t even necessarily doing it for Bucky, he was doing it for Riley, he was doing it for all soldiers lost in combat whether KIA, MIA, or POW. He was doing it because if there was even the smallest chance he could save Riley he would do so in a heartbeat. That he would turn the world upside down to not lose his wingman. And Steve knew that he would help Sam do so.  
They were up in the air in less than an hour.  
\---  
Tony turned back to the coffee maker in his lab, his 7th cup that night.  
“Ah! Of course the damn thing is empty!” He made a big show up thumping around looking for more coffee before JARVIS announced in his calming British accent  
“Sir, you have depleted the reserves of coffee in the lab. There is plenty of Columbian in the kitchen.”  
“Thanks, JARVIS” Tony muttered in responce and began his trek up to the kitchen.  
He was much quieter in the kitchen, he didn’t want to wake Pepper. Intellectually he knew that he would not, but the custom against being loud in a home when someone is sleeping is one that Tony actually respects. In keeping with this, he only turns on the lights over the cabinets, leaving the other half in shadow.  
“Ah, finally, here we go” He said, pulling a bag from one of the cabinets “come back to the lab with me, you fine piece of—“  
Abruptly he stopped when he saw the light reflect of a metal surface, a metal surface on his decidedly not metal table, his not metal table in his kitchen. He swallowed thickly and managed to choke out “JARVIS lights” to flood the room with light.  
What he saw stopped him in his tracks. All he could do was stare as HYDRA’s words played in his mind ‘Howard and Maria Stark die in car crash’, ‘when history didn’t cooperate it was changed’, as he stared at the man ostensibly responsible for the murder of his parents.  
He didn’t have time to call the new suit he was working on. There was no way JARVIS could get anyone here in time that was capable of dealing with the assassin. There might not even be time for him to tell JARVIS to tell Pepper he loves her.  
Tony swallowed again, not breaking eye contact with that icy blue stare. The longer this went on, the less panicked he became, the more logic started to prevail. If the assassin had wanted him dead, he’d be dead already. There’s no point in drawing out a kill like this. He must want something from Tony.  
Tony cleared his throat “Can I make you some coffee?” unknowingly mimicking Pierce in his offer, but his offer was genuine. The assassin simply shook his head. “Mind if I make some?” again, the headshake. Tony used the time he made the coffee to gather his wits about him, wondering how the assassin managed to get past his security protocols and why JARVIS had not alerted him to the intruding presence. He made a mental note to ask, once he figured out what was going on. He poured a generous amount of whisky into his cup and made his way back to the table, his movements slow and deliberate, hands visible. The closer he got the more he realised the soldier was nearly as jumpy as he.  
Tony took the seat opposite the soldier and waited. He knew, from his own experience, that when someone with PTSD is ready to talk, they will talk. Halfway through his cup, the assassin held out his arm.  
“I don’t know how to fix it myself” he said, his voice rough and cracked, as though he hadn’t spoken in a while.  
Tony was not expecting that. He took a deep breath and leaned forward, reaching for the bionic hand. As he made contact, the hand jerked away with the telltale sounds of servomotors in need of service.  
The soldier’s eyes darted from side to side and Tony could see he was fighting with the urge to run, the urge to strike, and the urge to not pull away.  
“It’s ok” Tony started “it’s, I mean, I won’t, there’s nothing, I mean, I know you came here for help and I will help you, I know you’re uncomfortable so we’ll just go slow, ok? I’m gonna sit in that chair there, ok?” he gestures to the seat next to the assassin who gave a short nod.  
“Ok, now I’m just gonna look at your arm, ok? I won’t touch it, I’ll just give it a visual inspection, ok?” he carefully kept eye contact and spoke clearly and softly, enunciating so the man could understand everything that was about to happen, and (hopefully) that Tony would not hurt him.  
After a cursory visual inspection of the arm, Tony could see that several of the joints (he termed thus for lack of a better one) were bent, there was circuitry exposed, what looked like burn marks from overheating. He was terribly fascinated and all he wanted to do was grab the arm and haul it, with its owner, to his lab and tinker for days on end.  
“Ok, I can see some of the things that are wrong. Can you move it? Like, full range of motion, can you move all your fingers?”  
He was rewarded with a demonstration: the assassin could move his arm up to shoulder height, the elbow only bent about 45 degrees, and his fingers could not close all the way to grasp anything. Tony sighed.  
“Ok. I’m certain I can repair your arm, but I’m not sure how involved the process would be.” He flashed back to Steve’s description of Pierce’s vault when they’d raided it: the chair where they’d tortured this man, how they’d lock him down and fry his brain – forcefully Tony stopped that train of thought. He would not torture this man, but he needed more information.  
Not thinking he called for JARVIS again.  
The soldier flinched and jumped up from the chair, glancing furtively around for the interloper.  
“Buck – um – James – um hey no it’s ok, it’s just um. It’s a computer, that talks to me, there’s no one here but you and me bud I promise you. It’s ok, can you sit back down?” He gestured to the chair.  
The soldier eyed him warily, took in all the corners and hiding places in the room before taking his seat again.  
“I’m sorry, I um, I wasn’t thinking. I’m going to ask JARVIS, my computer, to help me look at your arm. Is that ok?”  
The soldier nodded.  
“Ok, good. JARVIS, are you able to scan Buck – er. His arm?”  
“Yes sir, I have run several scans on Master Barnes’ arm. It is comprised of a titanium alloy, similar to your suits, though I am detecting some vibranium, the element that Master Rogers’ shield is made from. There looks to have been upgrades over the years as I am detecting carbon-fiber reinforcements. The internal circuitry is quite complex, however I am certain there will be no problem in replicating what is needed to repair the damage to Master Barnes.”  
“Thank you JARVIS,” Tony began, noticing how the man flinched at each ‘Master Barnes’ and even at ‘Master Rogers’; “are you able to tell if his arm is…” he faltered and then stopped. He was going to ask if the arm could come off, but the look on the assassin’s face stopped him. He knew the man already felt like he had been shattered into a thousand pieces and he didn’t want to actually remove a piece from him, at least not without a thorough discussion first.  
“JARVIS, are you able to scan and determine how his nervous system is connected to his arm?”  
“Sir, without a deeper scan, I am afraid I cannot with any certainty provide that information to you. I can, however, inform you that much of his skeletal system has been reinforced with the same titanium alloy and carbon composite, and his muscular structure and tendons have also been synthetically reinforced. Without this, I am certain his arm would not be able to be supported by his body.”  
Tony let out a low whistle. He had suspected, after what Sam had told him happened on the freeway, but there was no way to be sure without a direct inspection. He watched the assassin carefully, who had returned to his impassive face, as if the talk about his body were not of consequence.  
“So, good news, we can definitely repair your arm for you” he gave a tentative smile; there was little responce. “I uh. Can you… feel? With it? Like have proper sensation?”  
Slowly, the soldier made eye contact. Tony held it again, waiting patiently.  
“I can… feel. It’s… different.” The man swallowed and after several minutes Tony realised that was all he would get.  
“Do you feel… pain?”  
The soldier swallowed again, Tony could see his Adam’s apple bobbing, him wanting to say something, but afraid. It was all the answer he needed. He silently cursed Pierce for the hundredth time since he’d seen the assassin in his kitchen.  
“It’s ok. You don’t have to talk about it. I do not want to hurt you. At all. Ever. All I want to do is help you. So I will offer you a choice. I can give you drugs that will either relax you or put you to sleep so when I work on your arm you aren’t… as aware, we can not do the drugs and you can be… awake for the process, or we can do nothing at all. It is entirely up to you, and if you want to try something first just to see if it works, we can do that. At any time, if you want me to stop, I will stop. Ok?”  
The man just looked at him. He desperately wanted to just go to sleep and wake up and have his arm working again, but he was desperately afraid of being put to sleep. What if it was like being frozen? The idea terrified him. He knew he could stand the pain, it wasn’t just pain, not really; more like heat, like when you hold your hand over a flame until it blisters. Only he can’t pull away. He didn’t want to endure it though. Coming to Tony was hard, so hard. He knew the man could help, but even the idea of asking for help was so foreign to him, it was so ingrained that he could not ask for anything. Ever. But he couldn’t use his arm. He knew it would just get worse and worse until it was all but useless. He did not want that.  
“There is a drug… It can relax me? I won’t… go to sleep?” he managed.  
Tony nodded. “Yes. It makes you kind of high? Like loopy and relaxed and like nothing really matters. If you like, I can give you a dose so you know what it feels like and then you can decide if you want to do that when we work on you. Would that be ok?”  
Again with the choice. He racked his brain, what do I want? I want my arm to work. I want… spotty memories filled with blood and killing, snow and rock, shouting and whimpering overtook his senses and he moaned aloud, pressing his flesh hand to his eyes as if he could physically push the visions away.  
Tony’s first instinct was to back off, he was afraid that the soldier would dissociate and harm him, but the sound that came from the soldier was so filled with agony, so filled with need, that he just kept his place.  
“It’s ok man, you’re here, in the present, you’re in Stark Tower, you’re here with me, Tony, I’m going to help you, remember?” He repeated variations of this until the assassin looked at him with clear eyes.  
“I think… I think I would like to sleep.”  
Tony nodded. “Of course, sleep on it, think about it, do whatever man. I don’t need you to make a decision right away. When you’re ready. Ok? We don’t do anything until you are ready.”  
The man looked up at him “Please… please don’t tell… Rogers.”  
Tony was just dying to call Steve and let him know to come home, but he couldn’t do that now that the assassin had made his heartbreaking request. “Ok, yeah, sure man. I’ll put the Tower on lockdown. No one in or out unless you’re ok with it. Ok?”  
A slight nod.  
“Just so you know, my fiancée, Pepper lives here. Beautiful red head, very smart. She will not say a word to anyone about anything. I just wanted you to know in case you ran into her, so you’re not startled.”  
Another nod.  
“All right, let’s get you to your room then.”  
Slowly he led the assassin to a guest suite, showed him around briefly, asked if there was anything else he needed. A headshake.  
“Ok man, listen, if you need anything. ANYTHING. I don’t care what time, all you need to do is say JARVIS’ name and tell him what you need. If it’s me you need, JARVIS will alert me and I will be here right away. Anything else, like you need to know where ah, say, the library is, just ask JARVIS, ok?”  
Nod.  
“All right. Goodnight bud.”  
\---  
The assassin looked around the suite. A bed big enough for 5, a shower big enough for 5, he wondered what he should be doing with all this space. Slowly, he stripped off his tactical gear until he was just in his undershirt and boxers. He looked longingly at the shower, not even remembering the last time he had a hot one. He stared at the bed, his mind working why someone would need a bed that big, flashes of sleeping in a tent, on the ground, curled up in a group with men. When was that? No matter.  
He lay on the bed, it was so soft. Everything was soft. The pillows, the sheets, the comforters, even the mattress. It was like lying in a cloud. He grunted and got back off the bed, dragging a pillow and blanket, and made a pallet on the floor. For the first time in over 70 years, James Buchanan Barnes fell into a deep, healing sleep, feeling safe.  
He dreamed. Oh did he dream. He dreamt of a small, scrawny, blond kid whose nose was always running and knees and knuckles were always scraped. He dreamt of a small blond man who tried and tried to enlist but was not able to because of health. He dreamt of pulling boy after boy off the small blond kid, tending to the kid’s wounds, holding his hand on cold nights, listening to the rattling coughing in the kid’s chest. He dreamt of a larger man, who was the small man, but taller and stronger, and being the saved one. He dreamt of a blond man dressed in red, white, and blue, whom he followed everywhere. He dreamt of falling, falling, endless falling into the black of night; screaming, screaming, until he woke up, throat raw, flesh fist clenched painfully. He woke up screaming. He woke up to the computer-thing, JARVIS, saying ‘wake up Master Barnes, you are having a nightmare’ over and over.  
He sat on the floor, panting, dripping with sweat. He wanted to punch something, to break something. He wanted to tear the hated limb from his flesh and hurl it as far away from him as possible. He wanted… remarkably he wanted someone, anyone, to be there and tell him that it was ok, he’s not alone.  
“JARVIS?” he managed, his voice weak.  
“Yes, Master Barnes?”  
The assassin was too upset to notice the use of his known-not-known surname “can you… can you ask Tony to… I need to talk to him.”  
“Yes, of course Master Barnes. Right away.”  
The man climbed up onto the bed, wrapping the soft blanket around him. He was suddenly chilled to the bone but he didn’t know why. Several minutes later there was a knock, followed almost instantly by Tony bursting in.  
“What is it? Are you ok?” He all but ran across the room, but stopped short several feet away as common sense took over.  
The soldier looked at him. “I… had a bad dream” he said, flapping his flesh arm uselessly.  
Tony sucked in a breath, nodding. He knew of bad dreams. “Hey, it’s ok pal. Dreams are just that… dreams. But you’re here now, and nothing will hurt you so long as you are in my Tower, ok? Things will be ok. It will be hard, but things will get better, yeah?”  
Inwardly, the assassin could feel himself starting to warm. Tony had spoken to him the exact words he needed to hear, and they were starting to have the effect he desired. He felt… comforted.  
Tony shifted on his feet uncomfortably, but could see the soldier’s posture relaxing dramatically. He suddenly wished for Rhodey or Barton to be here, he felt that they would be more help. Hesitantly, he stepped closer and reached out his arm, as though to rest it on the other man’s shoulder. He stopped a few inches away.  
“Is this ok?” he asked, remembering how, after New York, when people would touch him it would make him feel broken inside.  
A slow nod.  
He put his hand on the man’s shoulder, patting it a few times, feeling extremely awkward. He could sense that the assassin felt the same way, but that he also needed to be touched. He needed human contact. Tony cringed inside thinking about how this man had been deprived of caring human contact for over 70 years. Had he been alone, he would have wept.  
He pulled back after a moment.  
“You slept for nearly 18 hours, so it’s near supper time. I uh, I can see if we can whip something up, or if you prefer I can bring something to eat to you. If you feel up to eating.”  
Choices, again. “I… I’d… I need a shower.” There, delaying the choice.  
“All right, well, I’ll make sure there’s a tray by your door and if you feel up to it you can just bring it to the kitchen. You can always check with JARVIS to find me, yeah?”  
Nodding.  
“All right then, I uh… what should I call you?”  
The man just stared at him. “Um. Don’t have a name. Not anymore” he said that last part bitterly.  
“It’s ok. You can decide on it later. I’ll stick to pal for now.”  
More staring. “You can call me James, if you want. It… it would be ok.”  
“Ok then, James, I will see you when I see you. Oh, by the way, there are clothes in the dresser… if you need anything just let JARVIS know, it will appear for you eventually, ok?”  
Nod.  
With that, Tony left the room.


	2. Awkward Meals

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bucky comes out for dinner. Pepper confronts him about his intentions.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi guys, sorry, I know everyone is looking forward to this and I've failed to deliver :[ this isn't a full chapter but a snippet, but since I wrote it, I thought I'd post it. I'm going to do some more work tonight :] thank you everyone for reading!

Ok, see, here’s the thing. Tony HATES not knowing what to do. He HATES not being in control. Most of all, he HATES when there is a puzzle in front of him and he cannot take it down to the lab and pull it apart to look at the pieces then put it back together again better than it was before. 

Tony tried to hate Bucky. He really did. He thought about his father, and how distant he was; he thought about his mother, how she tried. Knowing they were murdered made his blood boil – murdered! because they were a threat! – but he couldn’t be mad at Bucky. Not after what Steve told him they found in that vault. Even if Bucky knew what he was doing, how could he be blamed? He was tortured. How do you blame someone for doing something under duress? Tony knows torture. 

That doesn’t mean he’s overly thrilled to have the assassin as his new houseguest, but it doesn’t mean that he wants to kick him to the curb either. Maybe that last bit is because of the respect he has for Steve, maybe it’s because it reminds him of when Barton was controlled by Loki, or maybe it’s just because he knows what it’s like to be alone and have no one and nothing but yourself. 

With a small sigh, he closes the door to Bucky’s suite behind him and heads for the kitchen.

“How’s he doing?” Pepper asks, a little apprehensive. It took some convincing to keep her in the Tower once Tony explained there was a trained assassin who had killed his parents now bunking with them, but in the end, she understood that if Bucky were here to kill them, he would have done so – functioning arm or not. She had been nervously picking at her salad since Tony ran off when JARVIS alerted him to Bucky’s request. 

“Ah… He’s ok? I guess? He’s fucked up Pepper. Like, really fucked up. I mean…” Tony trails off, not knowing how to explain this to Pepper. “I told him I’d bring him some dinner, so I’ll be right back.”

He started making a plate for Bucky when he heard Pepper clear her throat softly, then a little louder. He turned to see what it was she needed. 

“I uh. That room… It’s so… Big. I don’t know…” Bucky was standing in the doorway to the kitchen, running his fingers through his hair – freshly washed – grimacing a little when they got caught in a knot. 

“Sure buddy!” Tony flinched a little at his own faked excitement. He cleared his throat and then gestured for Bucky to sit, trying not to glare at Pepper for moving her chair subtly closer to his own. 

“I was just making a plate for you, um, here.” He set the plate down in front of Bucky, handed him some silverware, and plopped back down in his chair. 

It was a very awkward meal. 

\---

“Hey, uh, James?” Pepper’s voice carried out to him on the wind, like the sound of birdsong. It took an extreme effort on his part to not immediately jump to a defensive crouch and pull out a knife. 

“Yeah?” 

“Why are you here?” 

It was blunt, but not really tactless. He waved his arm and repeated what he had told Tony the night before. Or was it two nights ago? Whatever. 

“Yeah, but why are you HERE. There are dozens of other places where cybernetic research is done, and I’m sure any one of them would be able to help you with that. Even under the radar. Why did you come here after what you did…” She trailed off, wondering if he even knew he’d killed Tony’s parents. Suddenly, she regretted coming up to the roof to talk to him. 

He just stared at her, his jaw working like he didn’t quite know the answer himself. Pepper turned to go back inside.

“I can leave… if it um, if you’ll feel… if that’s what you want,” he offered. It was genuine. 

Pepper stood facing away from him for several moments, thinking on that. She loved Steve, she really did, and eventually that won out her misgivings. She didn’t think she would ever be able to look at Steve again if she turned away his best friend.

“No, I don’t want you to leave” she turned back and looked him in the eye, “I just want to know why you came here, of all places.”

He broke eye contact first, looking down at his feet. Pepper just now realised that his feet were bare. 

“Because Tony is … he’s … He knows Steve. Right? Him and Steve… They’re…” he didn’t know the word. 

“Yeah James, they are.” 

Bucky nodded once and slowly turned away from her, not in a dismissive way, but because he was uncomfortable. He didn’t want to be here. He knew that, despite Tony’s assurances, people would wonder why the Tower was on lockdown. He knew he’d have to see Steve eventually, and face up to what he’d done. What he’d become. Once more, Pepper turned to leave, sensing that this was all the answer she would get for now, but that their conversation wasn’t over. 

Bucky spent the rest of the night looking out at the city, wondering what Pepper meant by “after what he did”. 

\---


	3. What's in the Arm?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tony lies to Steve. Bucky gets his arm examined. Pepper finds Bucky getting memories back

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not really AOU compliant; obviously not Civil War compliant. Minor spoilers (but not really) for both.

Tony groaned when he looked at the caller ID on his phone.  
“Hey, Cap” he said, trying not to sound like he was lying to him just by talking to him.  
“Tony. Hi. Svalyava didn't pan out.” Steve sighed into the phone.  
“I'm... not surprised...” Tony said slowly.  
Steve didn't seem to notice the reticence. “Have you got anything else for me?”  
The hopefulness in Steve's voice tore at Tony, he looked up at the ceiling, like he could see through it to where Steve's best friend was probably still sleeping. He'd done nothing but eat and sleep for the past three days.  
Tony couldn't blame him.  
“I've got no new intel,” Tony finally said. It was the truth, in a way, he had no intel about SHIELD or HYDRA bases that might be targets. But it was still a lie and it still upset him to lie to Steve. “Have you talked to Hill or Coulson?”  
Steve sighed again. “I called them, and Fury, before I called you. Fury said...” Steve stopped.  
“Fury said what?”  
“Fury said that you had gone dark. That you weren't letting anything out or in. I wasn't going to call when he told me that, but...”  
Tony tried not to sigh. At least not too loud. “Yeah, there's... there's a situation here Cap.”  
“Do you need us?”  
“No, we're good.”  
“We?”  
“Yeah, you know, uh, me, Pepper, JARVIS. We're all good here. I was uh, working on this... this thing... that Banner and I were tossing back and forth and... you know, it's just hard to explain. It wasn't good. But it's ok now.”  
Steve was quiet for several moments. In the background Tony heard Sam asking what was going on. Tony heard the disbelief in Steve's voice as he explained Tony's “problem” to Sam briefly.  
“All right, Tony. I'll leave you to take care of it then, just please call if...”  
“Sure, Cap. When, er, if I got something, I'll let you know.”  
He disconnected the call. He turned to set the phone down and Bucky was standing there, watching him with that unnervingly steady blue stare.  
“Hey, uh, James.”  
“Hey.”  
They stared at each other for a while, Tony wondering how long Bucky had been standing there, wondering what he'd heard; Bucky was wondering who Banner was and if Tony had lied about the Tower being secure. It took him a minute to register that Tony had called the person on the phone “Cap” and wondered what that meant.  
“Hungry?” Tony finally asked. He'd had more groceries delivered, considering how many calories Bucky packed away in a single day.  
Bucky just shook his head. “I'd like to...” he held out his arm a little.  
Tony nodded. “Sure, come down to the lab with me.”  
They headed to the elevator, Bucky a few steps behind Tony, making Tony a little more nervous than he felt he should be. After a few awkward moments in the lift, James said softly “Who's Banner?”  
Tony sucked in a breath. “He's a friend. A fellow scientist. We've, we've been working on a sort of, protection, well. Like an artificial intelligence to protect the world. It's, well, it's been interesting, to say the least.”  
Bucky nodded slowly. “Artificial intelligence?”  
“Yeah, like JARVIS.”  
“I thought you said JARVIS is a computer?”  
“Right, well, he is, but he's a thinking computer. He, uh, well his program is constantly learning and so is he, so he is an artificial consciousness.”  
Bucky nodded again “Why doesn't JARVIS protect the world?”  
Tony thought about that for a minute. “Well, JARVIS is just software, more or less,” he glanced at the ceiling like he was worried about offending the AI, “we need some hardware to help protect the world after what happened in New York.” Tony's brain kept going down that road... JARVIS, protecting the world? He needed to talk to Banner about this. He needed to think about the program they wanted to use. He needed –  
“New York?” Bucky asked.  
“Hmmm I guess you missed a lot, being as you were...” Tony waved his arm a little  
“Yeah. I did” came the soft reply.  
They went the rest of the way down in silence. 

 

Bucky looked around in awe and a little terror as he stepped into the gleaming lab, with its metal tables and ceramic alloys and machines and circuits; he had to pause and take a breath. Tony walked a few feet in front of him before he stopped and turned around.  
“Nothing will hurt you in here, ok? I told you I wouldn't hurt you. You're safe here.”  
Bucky eyed him warily for a minute. “Will Banner? be coming to... help?”  
Tony exhaled, thinking about how he'd lied to Steve about Banner, and now should he lie to Bucky about Bruce? Lying screws everything up. He thought about his birthday party, that one time. He sighed. He decided he'd tell Bucky the truth; there really was no point in lying to the man. Steve would just have to understand, but he needed to continue building trust.  
“Banner hasn't been here for months, and we haven't talked. It was Steve on the phone. He knew that the Tower was locked down, he wanted to know why. It was all I could think of, on the spot.”  
Bucky considered this. “How did he know?”  
Tony busied himself about the lab, trying to figure out what he needed to do first, and what tools he'd need to do that. “Well, you see, the thing is, James, is Steve is out there looking for you. I've been helping him. Me, and some people who worked for SHIELD – people we trust – we've been giving him intel as we dig through SHIELD's files and try to determine what was SHIELD and what was HYDRA and maybe... where you've been.”  
“Where I've been?”  
“Yeah, well,” he took in the look of confusion on the man's face “you left Steve on a riverbank and disappeared. He's been looking for you, and, well, there have been... incidents.” He wasn't sure how to describe them.  
Bucky cocked his head, questioning.  
“Separating SHIELD from HYDRA has been difficult, but every time we find a hidden HYDRA base, it seems, someone takes it out. Destroys it.”  
Bucky nodded. “That makes sense.” He lets that hang for a moment. “I don't do that anymore,” he said, so softly Tony almost missed it. “You lied to Steve? So he wouldn't know I was here?”  
Tony nodded slowly.  
Bucky looked down. “Thank you,” he said.  
Tony nodded again. “Sit here,” he gestured to a chair next to a workbench where a cornucopia of tools and diagnostic equipment was laid out.  
Bucky sat gingerly, as if he were afraid he would break the chair. Maybe he was afraid of breaking himself. Maybe there was no difference to him anymore.  
“Ok, so, we're not going to 'do' anything today; today I just want to scan it as much as I can, learn about it, and see how it's put together and so forth. There won't be any... anything physical.” He thought about how Bucky still shied away from even the most casual of touches. He closed his eyes and wished Steve were there. 

 

Bucky sat in the chair, watching Tony gather up his supplies. He carefully memorised each tool: what it looked like, where it had been placed, what Tony did with it. He wanted to ask questions, but he didn't want to ask questions. He just wanted this over with, he wanted his arm to work so he could disappear and not have to face the looks anymore. He knew now that Pepper accepted him, but would probably never trust him. He wondered why; it seemed personal with her. Tony was a mystery to him. He knew Tony was Howard's son, he could see the resemblance. It hurt him a little to look at Tony, but he wasn't sure why. He kept pushing those thoughts aside, afraid to examine them too closely. He assumed Tony accepted him for Steve's sake, and maybe a little for Howard's sake. Maybe someday he'd ask Tony about Howard. Maybe.  
He sat still for over two hours while Tony scanned and poked and prodded. He only talked when Tony asked him a direct question, Tony realised this after some time, but kept talking anyway, mostly to JARVIS. Bucky found the computer... artificial intelligence's? JARVIS' voice to be calming. It lulled him to a state of near somnolence.  
“Ok, we're done for now.”  
Bucky snapped back to full awareness. “For now?”  
“Yeah, I have a lot of research to do on all these scans and diagnostics I've taken. There've been so many upgrades and changes and … just … stuff plastered upon the older stuff and I need to sort it all out. It's remarkably advanced for the technology they had, back then.”  
Bucky nodded, thinking about Howard again. He opened his mouth to say something about the man, but closed it and thought better of it. For some reason he felt like it wasn't going to be a nice conversation. In fact, he was pretty certain Howard was dead.  
He didn't want to think about why he felt that way.  
“I'm going to get something to eat, then, if you don't need me anymore...” he trailed off, not even sure Tony heard him.  
Tony nodded absentmindedly, already engrossed in a 3D holographic display of the inside of the arm. Bucky made his way back to the elevator, like a sleepwalker. Things were starting to percolate to the surface, and he didn't want to think about them. He headed for the roof again, but he stopped on (one of? who knew with this place) the main living floor and wandered aimlessly room to room, until he came to a room with a large, shiny, black grand piano in the centre; the floor marble, the walls a rich oak, gilded with accents that probably cost more than he could even guess at. He wandered over to the bookshelves, looking at the titles, but not registering them, eventually making his way to a side table where a collection of pictures stood.  
He picked them up, slowly, studying them. The picture of Howard as a young man, when he knew him, in another life, stood out like a beacon, so he avoided it. He looked at pictures of Tony as a child, Tony with Maria, Tony with Pepper, Tony Tony Tony. At first he thought there was just one picture of Howard; but one was slightly hidden behind another. He picked up the one picture of Howard, Maria, and Tony dressed for Christmas; he just stared at it. Slowly, and with great effort, he removed it from the frame, careful to not destroy the frame with his awkward one and a half hand functionality. He turned it over, half hoping there was a date, half hoping there wasn't.  
“December 16th, 1991” read the inscription on the back.  
James set the picture down on the table, backing away slowly.  
“Do you remember?” a soft voice came behind him, again reminding him of birdsong.  
He couldn't turn around, but he couldn't keep looking at those pictures, accusing him, reminding him. Condemning him.  
He stopped and closed his eyes, counting his breaths. The images came to him, unbidden, unwanted. A long stretch of road, a car, a crash. A crash he caused. A car he forced off the road in to a tree. A trunk, a briefcase, glowing blue pouches: a mission. Sanction and extract. He pushed his fist into his eyes, again, trying to stop the memories from happening. Trying to stop the world, trying not to face what he did.  
“Yes” he finally said. “Yes, I remember.” Now he turned to face Pepper, “that's why you hate me.”  
Pepper looked at him coldly.  
James knew he should leave, he should have never come here. Why did he come here, anyway? Because he thought Steve's friend would accept him? Or because, deep down, he knew that he needed to make things right with Tony? How do you make something like that right? He stared at the floor, feeling Pepper's gaze bore into him.  
“Why?” Pepper asked.  
It was a simple question. What did anyone even know about him, about what had happened to him? He doubted there was anyone alive who could even answer all those questions.  
“I don't know,” he said finally.  
“Howard was your friend. He helped you. He... he was a father” she finished quietly.  
“I'm... I was... a weapon. They pointed me and fired.” It felt true enough.  
Pepper looked away, pondering that. She nodded after a moment.  
“How did you know?” He asked.  
“Tony told me.”  
Bucky sucked in his breath. So Tony DID know. He should leave. He should leave now. He didn't belong here, he didn't belong anywhere. Not for the first time, he wondered what it would be like to die and not wake up this time.


End file.
